It's been a while for this one. Sorry about that.
Chapter 6: Toxic Living
"Think it's safe to touch?" Kairi asks as she and Sora stare at some flesh caught in the cryo door. Sora hesitantly hums as he pokes it with the Keyblade. It squirms at the touch as though it was an injured bug.
"What's got your eye?" Isaac asks as he joins the two. He glances down at the squirming mess of flesh as his eyes widen behind his visor. "Is that—?"
"Part of the Hunter? Yeah." Sora replies, taking a few steps back. "It looks like it's trying to regrow, but all it can do is just move in place. Kinda freaky, to be honest." Isaac hums at Sora's words before taking a container from his hip. Using a pair of tweezers, he picks up the flesh and places it inside the container. Kendra seemed to notice as she immediately called Isaac to ask what he just picked up.
"Let's just call it a sample, Kendra. From Mercer's pet Hunter. I'm hoping I can find out how Mercer made it and who the Hunter used to be before he became…that."
"How do we do that?" Kairi asks as the trio steps away from the central device. Isaac hums as he places the container on his belt, securing it with a strap.
"Should be a DNA scanner somewhere on the Medical Deck. Maybe near Nicole's office." With trepidation, the trio make their way back to the main lab through the darkened corridors. They were fully surprised when they found the connecting corridor to the main lab still had working lights alongside the Main Lab, yet the absence of the Necromorphs was discomforting.
As though they were waiting for them to let their guard down for even a moment.
Quickly descending to the lower level, the trio find a DNA scanner nearby, out in the open. Apparently, someone was doing some studying before the deck was overrun. Isaac inserted the container, flicking the device on as it scanned the contents.
Beginning DNA analysis. Match found for: Brant Harris, mining contractor, Aegis VII. Registered physician: Dr Challus Mercer.
Warning! Severe DNA abnormalities found. RiG tracking is available to trace possible contagion. Authorise?
"Harris…what did Mercer do to you?" Isaac asks sadly while placing a hand on his visor. Sora and Kairi look to the ground in silence, silently conveying their emotions to Isaac. "Authorise."
Syncing logs and points of interest to RiG locator. Thank you for your commitment to public health.
"So, it was a miner called Harris? Where do we go now?" Sora asks as the trio begins to leave the Main Lab. Isaac opens up his tracker, bringing up a 3D map of the Medical Deck before pointing to the Emergency Wing.
"We need to find his ICU bed. It should be in the Emergency Wing area. Let's hope that our current luck keeps going."
To Isaac's surprise and internal joy, they found no Necromorphs blocking their way to the Emergency Wing either. And all it accomplished was setting his internal alarm off even more.
Finding the ICU bed was an easy matter as well, being the one that was torn open. Typing a command into the panel, an old video recording begins to play. The holographic emitters, still functioning, illuminate Harris, laying on the ICU bed with Mercers walking around him. Preparing a tool gun.
"Ah, now it's recording." Mercer speaks as he picks up eye examining tool. "Here, look up for me?" Harris obeys as he tilts his head up to Mercer. He places the tool over his eyes, looking at the back wall of Harris's eye. "Just a sliver of bone between us and the Marker's secrets."
Just from Mercer's tone alone sent a chill down the trio's spine. They already had a feeling how this was going to end.
"Relax. This won't be like on Aegis VII. That unpleasantness with your nurse." Mercer tries to soothe a jittery Harris.
"She wasn't a nurse when I…did that…" Harris shakingly replies. "But this 'errand' you want me to do in Ore Storage." He pauses to wince as Mercer injects something into the base of his neck. "The miners won't like it."
"They're probably as narrow-minded as the miners on the colony. Yes? Tormenting someone for being a little different." Mercer replies with a hint of indifference. His tone causes the trio to frown at the obvious way Mercer was influencing Harris. Yet the poor miner showed no hint of picking up on it. "Don't they deserve a good scare?" Mercer's words seemed to resonate with Harris as a determined look crossed his face. Mixed with anger.
"Yeah. Yeah, they do." He braces himself against the back of the seat, gripping the sides with his hands. "I'm ready." He says resolutely. Mercer smiles at him before picking up his tool gun and placing the barrel over his left eye. The sight caused the trio to instinctively look away, just as Mercer began to slowly inject a needle into the back of Harris's eye, piercing the bone of the skull.
Harris cries in discomfort as Mercer injects some material into a certain part of Harris's brain before suddenly crying out about the voices of the Marker. That he could understand them and answer them. The recording ends with Mercer asking him to tell him how.
"Well, that was uncomfortable." Sora points out as he looks to Isaac, overlooking the map. "Does it show where to go next?"
"Yeah, Ore Storage." Isaac informs before closing the map. "But we can't go there yet. Not only is it locked down, but we've wasted enough time here as is. We need to get to Hydroponics, but the station is locked down, so we'll have to go through the Tram Repair Station in order to reach it."
"So, back to the Flight Deck?" Kairi asks knowingly. Isaac nods as he leads the two back to the Tram Station and sets the location to the flight deck. Thankfully, there was a door at the Station that led to Tram Maintenance, which allowed them to avoid the long way they used last time to reach it.
Entering into Tram Repair, they were ambushed by a lone Pregnant as it stumbled towards them. Only for it to be hit by a blast of stasis from Isaac as Sora fires a Ripper blade into the Pregnant's arms, avoiding its bulging sack. Moving on, they arrive on the other side to find the door leading to Hydroponics open.
The moment they entered the connecting tunnel, they immediately wanted to leave.
"Dear Light, that stinks!" Kairi exclaims as she waves her left hand in front of her helmet, Sora doing the same.
"The smell must be seeping in through the filters. At least it's not kicking in the onboard oxygen." Isaac replies though the tone of his voice indicated he was scrunching his nose at the smell.
"I'm afraid I'm going to remember this smell in my dreams." Sora moans as the trio emerge onto the Tram station. Isaac quickly moves to lower the lockdown before joining the couple on the nearby lift leading to Hydroponics proper. Entering into the lift, they are contacted by Kendra.
"Guys, I can smell it coming from the vents. Are you in Hydro now?"
"Just got here. And we can smell it, too. The whole decks rotting." Isaac replies as he swats the air in front of him. "Have you found the source of te poison air?"
"Yes. These a huge mass in food storage that the crew definitely didn't grow. That crewmate you found earlier. He mentioned something about an enzyme. How would that help against it?"
"Guess we'll find out when we get there. Should be a workstation we can find that can tell me more." With the call ending just as the lift came to a stop, the three exited to find themselves in a small glass-walled garden area. Filled with fruits and vegetables. A loud hiss shrieks from the glass as a watering cycle initiates, showering the plants in nutrient-filled water. The sound gives the three a slight jump in reflexes.
Moving on past, the group entered into a connecting hallway filled with more glass containers lining the wall. But just as they reach halfway, a recording begins to play with a distressed woman with short black hair initialising the recording.
"Record and loop. This is Dr. Elizabeth Cross, to all survivors. Turn back." The now-revealed Cross says. "It's all gone. Everything we grew, my team—all dead. That monster…" She growls to herself before forcing a calm expression. "Please, leave. Get somewhere safe. If I can find a way to kill it, somehow… Jacob, if you are hearing this, you know I have to try." She then turns around and walks away, the recording ending before starting again from the beginning.
"What the hell happened here?" Isaac asks as they walk past the recording. Before Sora or Kairi could comment on his question, they found their answer in the room beyond. In the Hydroponic Central hub, one-half of the room stood clean and pristine. But the other half was overcome with the fleshy growth of the Necromorphs. The central control bench was awaiting commands while the door beyond, leading to food storage, was locked down from the central computer.
"I think that answers your question, Isaac." Kairi comments as they stare at the wall of flesh on their right. A shudder grows up their spine as they walk to the central computer, noting it requesting Liquid Nitrogen.
"This must be where they were making that enzyme. Just got to insert this and…" Isaac comments as he inserts the Liquid Nitrogen container into the computer. The contents are drained out instantly as the computer mixes the enzymes together. Soon, a new container is released, holding the enzyme as the door to Food Storage is unlocked. "Will this even work? It's only a small container against whatever is holding up in Food Storage…"
"We've got no other option. If we wait, we won't have any air left to breathe." Sora replies. Isaac grunts in agreement before heading to the bulkhead door. It opens to reveal a long gangway as the growth covers the entirety of the tube, looking more like it was made of flesh than steel. Ignoring the mass of flesh around them, the trio head to the door on the other side, ready for whatever was waiting for them, only for the door to lock down and a video call to appear before Isaac.
"No, no, no—Go back. There's no way into Food Storage. And even if you did, the Leviathan would devour you." A scientist in a gas mask tells them with panic in her voice. One that the three recognised.
"You're Elizabeth. You left that message in the hall to warn others." Kairi asks. Seeing her nod, she continues. "What is the Leviathan? Is that what is poisoning the air?"
"The air, my team. It's destroying everything. Not even the plants are safe…" Elizabeth informs mournfully. "I designed a special enzyme to kill the bastard, but I ran out of Liquid Nitrogen to make it. I sent a team to the Medical Deck, but I haven't heard back from them."
"I'm sorry to say, but your team is dead. Used as fucking lab rats by a Unitologist nut case." Isaac regretfully informs her. "But we got some Liquid Nitrogen and made that enzyme. Just tell us how to use it, and we'll kill this Leviathan."
"Really? Then we have a chance. Listen, you need to inject it into the Leviathan. You can't go into Food Storage, there's another way, but it's risky…"
"Same as running out of air?" Sora asks with a raised eyebrow behind his helmet. Elizabeth seems to get the hint as she moves her camera other to what could be described as a moaning pile of flesh shaped vaguely like a human.
"My team has been…altered. They are all connected to the Leviathan, breathing out its air. But that connection goes both ways."
"I get it, so if we inject the enzyme into these connections, it will pump it back to the Leviathan." Isaac summarizes with folded arms. Elizabeth nods at him as she casts a sorrowful glance at the transformed crewmate, the huge bulges on its back breathing out more toxic air.
"Yes. Please find the…Wheezers. End their misery. And when we are done, we will vent the bastard back into space. I'll send the location of the Wheezers to your RiG. Please, end their torment." And with that, she ends the call as Isaac receives the locations of the Wheezers, all eight of them.
"So, how shall we do this?" Kairi asks as the trio returns to the central hub. A quick glance at both passages told them that getting to the East Wing would be difficult, with the flesh growth blocking the door.
"We'll clear out the West side first. There's a connecting point between the East and West we can use once we're done." Isaac informs as he closes his map and heads to the West Entrance. "Let's get this done."
With time running against them, the three enter through the door into a tight corridor leading to a Flow Control room. Lining the right side of the room, large containers filled with hot boiling water stood waiting to send the water to the plants. Only for the emergency shutters at the bottom to be firing out streams of water every few seconds.
Waiting for the timing to be just right, the trio sprinted past the bouts of water, although Sora did get clipped in the leg as they passed the last one. A quick heal after, and the three were on a nearby service lift heading to the overhead gangway.
Where a Spitter was waiting for them. It fires a blob of acid at them, almost clipping Kairi in the shoulder as Isaac shoots its head off with a Plasma shot. A Ripper blade from Sora sends the Spitter falling to the floor as it lays still.
Walking over the pool of acid left by the Spitter, the trio enter into the West Growth Chamber. All around them, contained behind glass panels, sprawled a man-made jungle. Some plants were even trailing down the walls and support structures while audio clips of birds played in the background.
"Suddenly, I feel back at home on the Island. All that's missing is the sound of waves." Sora comments at the sight of the greenery. Kairi nods her head in agreement as Isaac scans the area. All seemed to be in order until a flash of movement caught his eye. He trains his Plasma Cutter on the area, the blue light illuminating the dark.
Caught in the blue light was a small Lurker crawling along the wall. It screeches at them in anger before deploying its spikes, only to have them cut off by Isaac. But its cry of anger was enough to alert its friends as another Lurker and several Slashers emerged from the darkness and charged at the trio. Two of the Slashers ran too close to an explosive tank and were eviscerated when a Ripper blade from Sora ruptured the tank.
Several more ran headlong into a firewall from Kairi before she switched to her Line Gun and removed them from their legs, leaving them to burn in the wall of flame. The last Lurker, seeing its comrades fall, runs into a vent and flees.
"Everyone alright?" Isaac asks as he scans the area. The couple calls out in acknowledgement, to which he nods his head. "These things are getting tricky, waiting for us to drop our guard." He mutters to himself before spying a locked room nearby. It was locked with a security level 2, to which he had access.
Opening the door, he finds the remains of a fight with dismembered corpses of Slashers littering the room and the body of a lone crewmate. What caught his eye about the slashers was how their skin seemed to have been peeled off or blasted. All that was left was bone and muscle.
Glancing at the dead body, he found the answer. Lying on the floor was a Handheld Graviton Accelerator. A grey cylinder connected to a grey block holds the trigger while yellow handles extend both above and below the barrel.
"This may be useful…" He mutters as he picks it up. He turns around to inform the couple, only to be met with an empty room. "Did they not follow me in?" He asks worriedly. He opens the door and enters the Growth Chamber again to see neither Sora nor Kairi waiting for him. Panic starts to build inside him as he begins to rush around the chamber only to find Kairi standing outside a door leading to another room. "There you are!" He exclaims, catching her attention as she joins her. "I thought I lost you two for a second."
"Sorry about that, Isaac." Kairi replies. "But we think that one of the Wheezers is in here. Sora just went inside to check and—" The door beside her opens, revealing a room filled with green smoke as Sora stumbles out, coughing up a storm. Kairi immediately moves to support him as the door closes behind as Sora's suit switches off the Life Support.
"Holy crap! You okay, Sora?" Isaac asks as Sora leans on the wall for support, taking deep breaths.
"Yeah…I'll be fine…" he says slowly as he looks up at Isaac. "I found one of them, but nothing I did to it could harm it. And the air… it's so bad that the Life support kicks in…" He hangs his head as he takes a moment to compose himself as Isaac groans.
"I should have given you some of the enzymes. That's my fault there." He shakes his head before walking up to the door. "I'll handle it. You take a moment to rest up." Not waiting for a reply, Isaac opens the door and steps inside. Instantly, his onboard air kicks in as a figure in the far back of the room is hazily outlined. A low moan rumbles through the chamber as Isaac powers through, eyes glued to the mutated husk.
Kneeling down, Isaac notes that the sacks on the back were actually the crewmate's lungs. Or at least, were his lungs before becoming a Wheezer. Shaking his head, Isaac retrieves an injector filled with some of the enzyme and stabs it into the Wheezer's neck near the base of the skull.
The Wheezer spasms and groans as the enzyme wracks through its body before falling over dead. It's lungs deflating. Sensing the Wheezer's death, the ship A.I. filters out the room and cycles in clean air while removing the lockdown of the other door.
"Alright, that's one." Isaac tells himself before heading outside. "Seven more to go." Entering the Growth Chamber, he sees Sora and Kairi standing near the lift back to back as a burnt-out husk of a Lurker lays nearby alongside the body of a Pregnant. "Looks like you guys had company." Isaac comments as he moves to join the two.
"Guess they thought we would be easy to ambush without you." Sora comments, energy in his voice after having time to breathe clean air again. Isaac chuckles at them before a call chimes on his suit.
"I picked up one of the Wheezers dying. I'm glad the enzyme worked. By the way, I never got to ask your names." Elizabeth asks over the comms. The trio mentally smacked their heads at forgetting common courtesy, but given the circumstances, it was easy to forget.
"Yeah, sorry. My name is Isaac Clark. System Engineer. With me are Sora Osment and Kairi Stoner. System Trainees."
"Engineer?" Elizabeth asks with a rising hop in her voice. "Have any of you seen Jacob?"
"Sorry, but we haven't." Sora replies. "We found some logs in engineering that he left behind but nothing else." They could hear a sad sigh from Elizabeth's end.
"Isaac's looking for someone else too. Have you seen or heard about Dr. Nicole Brennan? She's his girlfriend." Kairi asks.
"Dr. Brennan? Doesn't she help people leave Unitology?"
"Yeah, like my mother." Isaac reveals with a sad smile hidden behind his mask. "That's how we met."
"I see. I'm sorry, but I haven't heard anything. The Unitologists here didn't like anyone questioning them. And since the captain died, they all…snapped."
"Yeah. We had an encounter with one called Mercer." Kairi says with anger in her voice. An angry groan comes from Elizabeth's end at the mention of Mercer's name.
"Mercer… An extremist so bad that even Unitologists were creeped out by him. Anyway, best keep going. There are three more on the west side that need to be stopped."
With Elizabeth ending the call, the trio take the lift up to the top floor. Upon reaching the top, they find only a single door leading to Elizabeth's office. Opening it, they find one of the Wheezers crouching at the back.
Taking the syringe of his belt, Isaac repeated the process he did with the first, and soon the air was being cycled out. Retracing their steps, the three head to the middle floor with two ways to go. The refrigeration tower or the central connecting hub.
Deciding to take care of the Wheezers on the west side first, the three head to the refrigeration tower. Passing through a small corridor, which prompted Isaac to switch to his new tool and catch the eye of the couple, they entered a large open hallway with a glass floor.
But it was the lone Necromorph stumbling down the hallway that caught their eyes. It was skinny, with its feet joined into one leg while its left arm had been inflated into a large pulsing sack. It hops towards them, dragging its sack behind it as the trio look on with tilted heads.
Not wanting to wait and see what it will do, Isaac aims his newly acquired tool at the new form and fires. A blast of gravity erupts from the gun, sending the new variant sprawling over the floor as its skin is peeled off. Its sack slams against the floor hard, detonating in a large explosion as it showers the area with blood and bone.
The three take a moment to shake off any residual blood before the grates at the far back are busted open. Four more of the new variant emerge from the vents and begin slowly shambling their way towards the trio. Only for Kairi to detonate them all with a single shot from her Line Gun.
As silence once again fills the room, the couple turns to look at Isaac with curious looks.
"What is that tool you picked up, Isaac?" Kairi asks. Isaac chuckles at the question before pulling back on the top lever, repressurising the gun.
"This is called a Handheld Graviton Accelerator, or Force gun. It works the same way as Kinesis does, except in a more powerful format. Mainly used for blowing apart rocks or redirecting incoming collisions during mining operations. But it's very short range."
The couple look at the Force Gun with equal amounts of awe and trepidation. If that could blast apart solid rock, then they did not want to know what it could do to them. Especially after what they saw it do to that Necromorph. Speaking off…
"What do we call this new version? Exploder?" Sora asks as they walk over the charmed remains. Neither of them argued with the name, thinking it worked as is before the trio entered the refrigeration tower proper. Passing through into the Zero-G area, frost begins to build on the metal of their suits from the sub-zero temperatures of the tower.
While Sora and Kairi change their Keyblades into gliders for ease of movement, Isaac opens the partition doors, allowing them access to the higher level. A couple of Lurker's attempt to ambush them as they pass through but are quickly dealt with by the group, feeling no fear at the small Necro's.
Arriving at the top, they could see the area beyond them was engulfed in toxic air, held back by the field that separated the Zer-G area from the gravity of the next room. And while they could make out the Wheezer's head hiding behind one of the walls, their mission was made complicated by the Guardian clinging to the far side.
With a nod from Isaac, Sora pulls out the Contact Beam and holds it with both hands. With some prompts from Isaac, Sora switches the mode to its alt and holds down the trigger. Instead of a concentrated beam of energy, the Contact Beam seemed to charge with power before unleashing it as an orb of pure energy. It flies through the air, smashing into the Guardian as it tears out in entire midsection.
As the Guardian dies from the loss of its centre, the Contact beam ejects a canister as steam rushes from the vents on the front. As Sora inserts a new canister into the gun, Isaac walks into the contaminated room and injects the third Wheezer.
With another Wheezer down, the trio retrace their steps back to the Growth Chamber only to be present with a new problem. In order for them to head to the next area, they had to reroute power to open the door. But given the choices open to them, rerouting power from the ambient noise made more sense than turning off the lights.
With the path opened, the trio head to the connecting door, already seeing the contaminated air leaking out around it. Inside lay a room swamped in the toxic gas, the orange lights making it look thicker than what it actually was. Large flesh grows snaked around the room as the door leading to the East Growth Chamber was completely covered.
Finding the fourth Wheezer was still just as easy as it was located near a glowing sack on the wall of flesh. With the Wheezer taken care of, the air was once again cycled out, leaving behind several crewmate bodies.
In an instant, Infectors leap out of the vents and beeline straight for the bodies. Kairi lays down a wall of fire to block one while Isaac uses the grenades on his Pulse Rifle to blow the wing off the other.
With the Infector's movement hampered, they turn their ire on the trio and head for them, only to be blasted by Isaac's Pulse Rifle and a Ripper blade from Sora.
With the area cleared, Isaac destroys the pulsing mass to clear the door, opening the way to the East Growth Chamber. Stepping into the chamber revealed a room covered in the growing flesh. Not a single surface had been untouched by the growth. All the plants had been devoured or were in the process of being devoured by the growth as the air was filled with brownish smog.
"Habitat changer indeed…" Isaac mumbles as he shoots another pulsing sack, clearing the way around the lift. As Sora and Kairi look over the railings, scanning for any signs of the Necromorphs, Kendra contacts Isaac.
"Isaac, I looked up Dr. Cross's notes on the—" She pauses as she gasps at something, a hand covering her mouth.
"Kendra? Everything okay?" Isaac asks, concerned. Kendra apparently doesn't hear him as she begins to mumble to herself.
"It's him. Two doors behind you. Kieran…" She pauses in her speech as he gives off a puzzled hum as she shakes her head. "Wait, he's gone. He just waved at me, and… S-sorry, Isaac. You guys keep going. It was just a glitch on the camera."
"If you say so…" Isaac replies as the comms go silent. Is the Marker now affecting Kendra? Just how long can we go before we all go mad? He shakes his head before moving to join the couple at the entrance to air filtration. The same hallway greeted them as it did on the way to the Refrigeration Tower, yet the hallway beyond that was covered in growth, along with a giant hole in the wall, evidence of a Drag Tentacle.
Eyes open and weapons raised, the three made their way down the hall, winding past the growths jutting out from the sides. But as ready as they were, nothing came at them. No Necromorphs and no Drag Tentacles.
"Maybe it's moved to a different part of the ship?" Kairi asks as they near the exit, trailing behind.
"Let's hope so. Encountering one is bad enough, but—"
"AHHHHHH!"
"KAIRI!"
Isaac whips his head around as he hears the cries behind him. To his horror, a Drag Tentacle had attacked them from behind and was currently trying to drag Kairi away as Sora held onto her hands while stabbing Kingdom Key into the ground.
The Contact Beam Sora was holding lay discarded nearby as the two were slowly being pulled away.
Isaac wastes no time rushing for the discarded gun and aiming it right at the Drag Tentacle. He holds down the trigger, unleashing a beam of energy at the Drag Tentacle's weak spot. The Beam slices through it like butter as the dismembered half falls to the ground while the rest of the tentacle retreats back into the darkness.
"Fuck those things!" Isaac screams as he rushes to the couple while they slowly rise from the floor. "You two okay? No pulled muscles or anything?" The two were breathing deeply to calm their nerves before looking back at Isaac. They nod slowly as they regain their footing while Isaac hands Sora back the Contact Beam. "Think you'll need this."
"Yeah. Thanks for the save, Isaac." Sora breathes as the trio quickly leaves the hallway. "It came out of nowhere…"
"What matters is that you two are alive. That is all." Isaac replies calmly, although he would be lying if he said he wasn't rattled as well. Proceeding on, they enter the Zero-G area, finding it just as infected as any other part of the East. Using the thrusters on their back, the trio flew up to the upper area, swerving past attack pods that seemed to grow from the flesh of mass around them.
Reaching the top, they find the way to Air Purification unblocked with a nearby control terminal for the turbines. Isaac inputs a command into the terminal to shut the turbines down so he can search without fear of getting torched. But the moment they entered the room, a small problem arose.
Warning: Thermodynamic purifiers malfunctioning. Stand clear of filtration tubes.
"Well, isn't that great?" Isaac sarcastically asks. He glances around the room, noting how low the ceiling was and thus eliminating Sora and Kairi's Keyblade Gliders from being an option. Going through the control room is a no-go due to the door on their side being locked down. Leaving them with one option.
Or rather, one option for him.
"You two stay here." He says to the couple before walking to a nearby lift. "I'll head on over through the tubes." The two look at him, their faces hidden by their helmets. "It's easier if only one of us has to rush through rather than all three of us. Stay here and keep an eye out. I'll see if I can open the door on the other side." Not giving the two a chance to argue, he activates the lift and descends to the lower floor.
Running alongside was the metal wall separating him from the periodic flames of the air purifier. The door leading inside is blocked by a fuse. I'm going to have to blow the fuse on all of the doors, aren't I? He shakes his head before slamming his Plasma Cutter into the fuse box and opening the door. Heat instantly rushed out the open door as flames danced past before suddenly stopping.
Taking a peak, he could see the other door he needed to open along with the fuse box. Taking aim with the plasma cutter, he fires at the box, opening the door just as the flames ravage the chamber again. He steps back, avoiding the flames, before glancing at the second chamber. The walls were segmented, opening and closing depending if the flames were burning or not.
Getting an idea, he waits for the middle chamber to end its cycle before blowing the fuse leading to the third chamber. The moment he does, he starts to sprint, just making it to the second chamber before the first is engulfed in flames.
But as he runs for the third, two Slashers clamber from vents behind him. Seeing the fires in the third chamber dying down, Isaac blasts the two Slashers with stasis before rushing into the chamber. Just as the middle chamber is engulfed in flames and incinerates the Slashers.
Breaking the final fuse box, Isaac escapes the purifiers and takes a moment to breathe. I am NEVER doing that again! Straightening his back out, Isaac walks to the nearby lift and activates it, bringing him back up to the higher level.
And in view of a relived Sora and Kairi. They wave to him with their free hands, to which he waves back before heading to the control room. Spying the exposed fuse box, Isaac smashes his Plasma Cutter into it and opens the door.
"You alright, Isaac?" Sora asks as he and Kairi regroup with Isaac in the control room.
"I'm fine. Just left behind some roasted Slashers in the middle chamber, but I'm not in the mood for a barbeque." His remarks get a small chuckle out of the two before he turns around. "The next Wheezer is through one of these doors. Let's find it out and get out of here." The three return to where Isaac appeared and head for the nearby Annex Storage Room, hoping to find some supplies or another Wheezer. Opening the door, they find the Room completely cleaned out, along with the Wheezer they were looking for.
As Isaac took care of it, Sora and Kairi scavenged the room for anything they could find but only came away with two Stasis packs and a large Med Pack. It was not what they were hoping to find, but better than nothing.
With the Wheezer taken care of, the trio proceeded to leave the Air Purifier via a nearby lift, taking them back down the East Growth Chamber. During the trip, Isaac's comm briefly flares with Nicole's voice being barely audible over the radio static. All the while, the lights around them start to dim before glowing back at full strength. Isaac tries to talk to her, but the comm ends abruptly before he can even get a word in. Tightening his hand into a fist, he marches on down the hall, with Sora and Kairi following after him with worry.
Entering into Seed Room B, they quickly find another Wheezer that had hidden itself behind a wall of flesh. With the pulsating pouch located only on their side of the wall. Swiftly dealing with both the Wheezer and the wall of flesh, the group enter the East Chamber proper, only for the room to go into a quarantine lockdown.
Bunching up together, they prepare themselves for a horde attack, only to quickly break formation when a Brute comes charging at them as it smashes through glass cylinders that once held fruits and veg.
While the Brute charges past them and slams into the wall behind, the trio quickly spin around and blasts it with three lots of stasis. Drastically slowing the brute down. All it could do was spin slowly as Sora and Kairi ran up to slice its arms off.
"You know, these things were a lot more frightening when we first encountered them. Now they all are just giant annoyances." Isaac comments as they group up, activating a waymarker to find the next Wheezer.
"Well, we have been lucky that they've only attacked us by themselves. It would probably be a lot harder if they had help." Sora comments, remembering how his usual foes had always employed such tactics. Then again, these things were brain-dead more often than not.
"That we have…" Isaac admits, looking over the blue line heading into another storage room. "Come on, we have two more Wheezers left then we are done with the Leviathan." Moving into the room, they find the Wheezer sitting right in the middle, puking its guts out. A simple stab to the back of the neck spelt the end of Wheezer number seven.
Leaving the last one somewhere in the Central Chamber. With a flick of his wrist, Isaac brings up the tracker, only to frown as it leads them up to the ceiling of the room, with a mass of flesh blocking the lift.
"We need to turn off the gravity. That's the only way we will reach the last Wheezer." He speaks with annoyance as he looks around the walls. How did a Wheezer get up there anyway? Better yet, why were the Wheezers placed like they were? Shelving those questions for a later date, Isaac spies the nearby control panel dictating the gravity in the room.
He walks over to it, signalling the couple as he prepares to deactivate the gravity in the room. With reassuring nods from Sora and Kairi, he deactivates the gravity, sending the three slowly into the air as the onboard thrusters activate.
With the Zero-G active, the trio floated to the top of the room only to find the entire top floor covered in the toxic mist. The fact that it was condensing up here and not spreading down told them more than they needed to know. Ignoring the question that came to their minds, the trio floated over to the last Wheezer, perched on a ledge blocked off by a mound of flesh. Landing beside it, Isaac injects the final Wheezer with the enzyme, killing it and sending more of the enzyme into the Leviathan's heart. A thunderous roar echoes within the ship as Hydroponics shakes, just as Elizabeth activates a comm channel.
"They're at peace." She sighs sadly into the channel as her grief briefly takes over before recomposing herself. "Thank you. The Leviathan's metabolism is slowing down. It's working!"
"That's great, but something is wrong." Kairi interrupts as the shaking increases around them.
"But it must have worked. You gave it enough enzyme to melt a freighter." That statement gave Sora and Kairi a moment of pause. How big did she mean by 'freighter'? "I'm unlocking the doors to Food Storage. Quickly, get back there and vent the bastard before he has a chance to recover and poison the deck again."
"On it." Isaac ends the call as the trio begins sprinting (or rather, floating in the Zero-G area) back towards the central hub. To their surprise, yet again, no Necromorphs stood in their way to stop them fulling their worries for a massive ambush waiting for them. However, a large roar echoes through the ship as they reach Flow Control, destroying all the vents in the wall next to them.
Heading back into the tunnel leading to Food Storage, the trio move past the bulkhead and enter into the airlock. A control panel stood next to them, free of matter, as the airlock door leading to Food Storage proper remained locked down. Isaac moves to the terminal as Sora and Kairi take up guard positions around him. With a few holographic button presses, Isaac activates the airlock doors of Food Storage, opening the room to the vacuum of space.
Or at least, that's what was supposed to happen.
"Damn it! The airlock is open, but the Leviathan is too strong! It's clinging to the interior of Food Storage! We need more enzyme."
"We've got no other choice. We'll head in there and force it out." Isaac replies, loading a new plasma pack into his Cutter. Kairi switches to her Line Gun while Sora readies the Contact Beam. They would need the heavy firepower for this.
"The Leviathan has a ten-kiloton mass! Do you REALLY need me to tell you that this is a bad idea?!"
"Well, I'm all out of good ideas, so guess what's left." Ending the call, Isaac opens the door into Food Storage. Walking out onto a small platform, they find themselves in a large, dark, cylindrical Zero-G room. Summoning their Keyblade gliders, Sora and Kairi hover into the air, with Isaac hitching a ride on Kairi's glider.
All around them, the lights slowly turn on, illuminating a massive wall of flesh before them.
A wall of flesh that suddenly comes alive as a voracious maw opens in the middle, while three smaller holes open around it in a triangle shape. Drag Tentacles shoot out from the holes, ready to attack or snare anything in their path.
"This is going to be a long one…" Isaac mutters as Kairi manoeuvres her glider to avoid an incoming strike. Isaac aims his Cutter at the tentacle's weak spot, severing it after a few well-placed shots. The Leviathan roars in agony as it launches a second strike at them, only for the tentacle to be blasted away by Sora's Contact Beam.
It growls at them as it retracts its other limb before spitting out explosive balls towards the trio. Sora and Kairi manoeuvre around the blasts as Isaac grabs them with his Kinesis and throws them back at the Leviathan, damaging it with its own attack.
The Leviathan roars in anger as it realises it is in danger. As a last act, it expels its remaining gas, filling the room full of toxic air.
"We've got it on the rope, guys! Keep hitting it!" Isaac calls out as Kairi moves to avoid another tentacle, using her Line Gun to sever it in half at the weak point. Sora aims his Contact Beam at the Leviathan's mouth, firing the beam straight into the maw just as it is about to spit out another explosive ball.
The explosion rocks the Leviathan, feeling the pain of its own attack inside itself. It roars once more, weaker than before it is suddenly and violently ripped from behind. Plunged into the vacuum of space, it could do nothing but roar into the soundless voice as the airlock slammed shut, expelling the remains of its toxic air.
Toxic Hazard: Cleared.
"You can say that again, Ishimura. You can say that again." Isaac breathes as the trio returns to the platform. Saving their moment of victory against a titanic foe.
"And lo, you crushed the heads of Leviathan—he will be meat for the wilderness."
"Isn't that a bit dramatic, Elizabeth?" Kairi asks with a smile as they enter the tunnel. Elizabeth activates a video comm as she removes her mask, showing a rare smile.
"It felt appropriate for such an event. Thank you; you avenged a lot of people just now."
"Just doing what was right." Isaac replies with a grin before getting serious. "Listen, we need to get off the Ishimura. But the ship we came on was destroyed. Do you know of any other way of getting a signal out? We won't last without help." Elizabeth puts on a thoughtful look before nodding to herself.
"I think so. On the mining deck Jackob, my Jackob, was putting together a rescue beacon with some other survivors. But I haven't heard from him in a while."
"Still, sounds like it's our best shot. We'll check it out." Sora replies as they make their way back to the lift. "Should we contact you if we find Jackob?"
"If you do find him, please do. But if for some reason you can call, please tell him that I miss him. And that I will find him."
"Don't worry, we will. Can I ask you to do the same if you see Nicole?"
"Of course. Stay safe, you three." And with that, she ends the call just as the three enter the lift.
The next destination, the Ore Deck. Where, hopefully, a rescue beacon awaits them, ready to be used.